Employer Satisfaction Survey
The ESS is the only national survey that measures how well graduates from Australian higher education institutions meet employer needs. It uses a unique methodology to link the experiences of graduates to the views of their direct supervisors. Data from the ESS are used to better understand the specific skills and attributes needed by today’s employers, how well higher education is preparing graduates for the workforce and the varied employment pathways graduates are taking after completing their study.
Target population
Employers of graduates of Australian higher education institutions
Responses
2,992 supervisors of employed graduates
Survey cycle
Conducted annually
2023 ESS Results
Employer satisfaction with graduate attributes and overall satisfaction, 2023 (%, with 90 per cent confidence intervals)
In 2023, overall employer satisfaction was higher for students who attended some or all of their classes on campus (internal or mixed mode) (85.5 per cent) in comparison to students who undertook all their study off campus (external mode) (80.3 per cent). Consistent with previous years, supervisors rated internal/mixed mode graduates more highly on collaborative skills relative to external
graduates (88.3% and 81.9% respectively).
Employer satisfaction with graduate attributes and overall satisfaction by study mode, 2023 (%, with 90 per cent confidence intervals)
Employer satisfaction with graduate attributes and overall satisfaction, by broad field of education, 2023 (%, with 90 per cent confidence intervals)
| Foundation | Adaptive | Collaborative | Technical | Employability | Overall satisfaction | |
| Natural and Physical Sciences | 92.0 (88.5, 94.6) | 87.8 (83.7, 91.0) | 86.4 (82.2, 89.7) | 91.9 (88.3, 94.5) | 84.0 (79.4, 87.7) | 84.8 (80.4, 88.3) |
| Information Technology | 89.5 (84.0, 93.3) | 87.0 (81.1, 91.3) | 83.9 (77.7, 88.6) | 86.0 (79.9, 90.4) | 80.0 (73.3, 85.4) | 80.8 (74.3, 86.0) |
| Engineering and Related Technologies | 95.0 (92.0, 97.0) | 90.9 (87.2, 93.7) | 86.6 (82.4, 90.0) | 95.3 (92.2, 97.2) | 87.3 (82.9, 90.6) | 88.8 (84.9, 91.9) |
| Architecture and Building | 92.4 (85.0, 96.5) | 90.5 (82.4, 95.2) | 95.5 (88.8, 98.5) | 96.9 (90.6, 99.4) | 85.7 (76.9, 91.6) | 85.3 (76.8, 91.1) |
| Agriculture and Environmental Studies | 96.6 (91.4, 98.9) | 96.4 (91.0, 98.8) | 90.7 (84.1, 94.8) | 96.5 (91.3, 98.9) | 90.4 (83.5, 94.6) | 90.8 (84.3, 94.9) |
| Health | 91.3 (89.2, 93.0) | 86.6 (84.2, 88.8) | 87.0 (84.5, 89.1) | 92.2 (90.1, 93.8) | 82.0 (79.2, 84.5) | 85.8 (83.3, 88.0) |
| Education | 90.7 (88.0, 92.8) | 89.6 (86.9, 91.9) | 85.2 (82.1, 87.9) | 93.0 (90.6, 94.8) | 85.5 (82.4, 88.1) | 87.4 (84.5, 89.9) |
| Management and Commerce | 90.1 (87.6, 92.2) | 88.3 (85.6, 90.6) | 85.5 (82.6, 88.0) | 90.8 (88.3, 92.8) | 87.1 (84.2, 89.5) | 78.7 (75.4, 81.7) |
| Society and Culture | 90.2 (88.0, 92.0) | 88.6 (86.3, 90.5) | 84.7 (82.2, 86.9) | 92.5 (90.6, 94.1) | 82.2 (79.5, 84.6) | 82.4 (79.7, 84.7) |
| Creative Arts | 91.1 (85.5, 94.7) | 88.4 (82.4, 92.6) | 86.5 (80.2, 91.0) | 90.7 (85.0, 94.5) | 82.9 (75.9, 88.1) | 75.4 (68.4, 81.3) |
| Total | 91.2 (90.3, 92.0) | 88.7 (87.7, 89.7) | 86.0 (84.9, 87.1) | 92.2 (91.3, 93.0) | 84.1 (82.9, 85.2) | 83.7 (82.6, 84.8) |
In 2023, graduates from Agriculture and Environmental Studies had the highest employer satisfaction for foundation (96.6%), adaptive (96.4%) and employability (90.4%) attributes. Graduates from the Architecture and Building field of education had the highest rates of employer satisfaction for collaborative (95.5%) and technical (96.9%) attributes.
Overall, employers reported the highest satisfaction for Agriculture and Environmental Studies’ graduates at 90.8%. This was followed by Engineering and Related Technologies (88.8%) and Education (87.4%) graduates.
Main ways that the qualification could have better prepared the graduate for employment, 2023 (%)
Extent to which qualification prepared graduate for current employment, 2023 (%)
While both graduates and supervisors thought the qualification prepared the graduate for their current employment, supervisors tended to rate the preparedness of graduate employees higher than the graduates rated themselves (at 94.0 per cent and 86.9 per cent respectively).
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About the ESS
The ESS provides information about the quality of education provided at Australian institutions, by asking supervisors to provide feedback about the generic skills, technical skills and work readiness of the graduate employed in their workplace. It is the first national survey that links the experiences of graduates to the views of their direct supervisors. The ESS is undertaken on a systematic basis by asking employed graduates who participated in the GOS to provide the contact details of their supervisor for follow up. The ESS has been conducted annually since 2016.
While there are an insufficient number of responses to publish institution by study area results on the ComparED website, the ESS is large enough to provide comparisons by broad field of education, course characteristics, employment characteristics, occupation and demographic group.
Results are pooled across the three most recent collection years to enable comparisons across universities. This follows the approach for other surveys on the ComparED website where results are pooled across years to improve the robustness and validity of data. The QILT reports and ComparED website do not publish results where there are fewer than 25 survey responses. For this reason, results for individual non-university higher education institutions (NUHEIs) are not shown as the number of employer responses is generally too small.
- Overall satisfaction
- Foundation skills - general literacy, numeracy and communication skills and the ability to investigate and integrate knowledge
- Adaptive skills - the ability to adapt and apply skills/knowledge and work independently
- Collaborative skills - teamwork and interpersonal skills
- Technical skills - application of professional and technical knowledge and standards
- Employability skills - the ability to perform and innovate in the workplace
Overall satisfaction
The percentage of supervisors who expressed overall satisfaction with their graduate.
Foundation skills
The percentage of supervisors who expressed satisfaction with graduates’ foundation skills.
Adaptive skills
The percentage of supervisors who expressed satisfaction with graduates’ adaptive skills.
Collaborative skills
The percentage of supervisors who expressed satisfaction with graduates’ collaborative skills.
Technical skills
The percentage of supervisors who expressed satisfaction with graduates’ technical skills.
Employability skills
The percentage of supervisors who expressed satisfaction with graduates’ employability skills.